


Accords

by Davechicken



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-29
Updated: 2016-11-29
Packaged: 2018-09-03 02:44:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8693284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken
Summary: Things need... agreeing... when the war is over.





	

Hux had vowed - always - to fight til the last man. Until he, alone, wielding a pointed bit of wood was left with his back against the wall, his boots scuffed and his uniform in tatters around him. He’d sworn his ultimate allegiance to the First Order, and there had never been a ‘just in case’, never been a contingency, or a plan in place for defeat.

But then the Jedi resurgence had slaughtered the Supreme Leader, and his peons had scattered. Hux had pulled them back under his aegis, but the morale dip, or the… curse of Jedi dominance… 

They’d lost. More ships than could be countenanced. More souls than he could replenish. They’d been routed, and that was that. 

He’d looked at the reports, and he’d double- and triple-checked them. He’d run variables, and projections, and he’d widened his margins and narrowed his desired outcomes and he’d still not made it work.

Kylo had begged and pleaded with him, and that’s when he’d known it was over. Kylo’s loyalty to the Order - or to Snoke - had never been the same calibre as his own, but his _aversion_ to his once-family? That had run as deep as Hux’s hatred for the Republic.

So Hux had opened the negotiation table with a woman whose voice and face were eerily familiar, and which made his skin crawl. He’d signed off on accords and treaties and accepted sanctions and so on and so forth. Months of discussions, during which he saw people desert the Order or proclaim him a traitor. 

But he was doing this for them. He was doing this so they could be free, after. Without fear of arrest or bounty. Free to become citizens of wherever they wanted. He had to remind himself that life under tyranny was better than death for them, and he’d _always_ been loyal to his men and women. Always. 

The final agreement done, he stares across the table at the short General.

He doesn’t hold the same rank, now. He holds no rank at all. He’s a private citizen, and he doesn’t know how he’ll live as one. Maybe he’ll take a ship and fly too close to–

“Has he said if he will… meet with me?” the Organa woman asks.   


She’s an Organa. She’s also a Skywalker, and a Solo. A family of many names, and just as many faces. 

“He doesn’t want to at this time, no.”  


“Thank you for asking. He knows that–?”  


“He knows that the door is always open, even to a comm chat, yes. I have told him, with as little prejudice as I can. But this is too soon, and he… is not prepared to face you, yet.”  


Face. As if it’s some military matter, and not a mother and her son. Kylo never denied that she was that, but he’d brushed off any and all attempts to be reintroduced to her, after the first contact to start this negotiation. He’d not been able to help in person, but he’d gone through the minutiae of the agreements to make sure they got the best deal possible, with no hidden stings.

“I know this cannot have been easy for you,” comes her platitude.  


Please. He wants to stab her through the gut and run his blade up to her throat. “Indeed.”

“You did the right thing.”  


Most people on his… he can’t even say ‘his side’ now, can he? Most of the people who had been on his side wouldn’t agree. But they could live _to_ disagree, and that was the important part.

“If that’s all, I’ll be going.”  


Behind him, he hears Kylo breathing. He’s out of range of the holo-emitters, so Leia can’t see him. Hux wonders if she can feel him, or if the distance is too great. 

“Tell my son I love him.”  


“I shall.” He cuts the line, and turns.  


Kylo walks over, and finds his face in his hands. Kisses him, soft and sweet. Hux’s fingernails (bitten to nothing) rub the inside of his coat-sleeves. 

“Much as it pains me to admit, she _is_ right.” It sounds like it does pain Kylo, in truth.  


“I’ll believe that when I feel it,” Hux says, and pushes his forehead to the Knight’s.   


“You have a question?”  


He does. He’s been trying not to voice it, but it crawls across his tongue. “Why didn’t you go back to them? Why… did you stay?” With me?

“You’re my family, now, Hux. Not them. She may have given birth to me, but she doesn’t know who I _am_. You do.”  


Hux clasps his hands over the ones on his face, breathing harder. “I don’t know… who _I_ am.”

“I do,” Kylo says, and their thumbs slide together. “You’re braver than anyone I’ve ever met. And you’ve saved more than just the lives of your troopers and officers. You’ve saved everyone they would have shot, too.”  


“But the ones that already died?”  


“We’ve made a point, still. In your terms, in the message you brought to the galaxy. But the strongest voices win, and we just have to know… we changed the words those voices say.”  


Hux feels wrong inside his uniform for the first time in forever. He wants to throw it off, burn it. There’s nothing left for him to wear if he does. “Please, don’t leave me now,” he begs, even though he should never admit to such a weakness, never show his full hand. But without Kylo, nothing remains to define him. He _is_ nothing, alone. Not now.

“Never,” the Knight says, fiercely. “I’m with you to the end.”  


Hux had thought that about the Order… but a hand on his shoulder had pulled him to a new path. One he’s not sure where it leads, just who walks alongside him.


End file.
